Keys to Any Successful Team

Work Teams

Interdependent group of people trying to achieve a common outcome

One person is not enough

Meso level of analysis

Team halo effect

• Level of analysis
  • Individual (micro)
  • Team (meso)
  • Organizational (macro)
    
• Types of teams
  • Problem-resolution teams
    • purpose: solving ongoing problems
    • Ex. CDC diagnostic team & epidemics
  • Creative teams
    • Purpose: innovation, exploring possibilities
    • IPOD team at apple
  • Tactical teams
    • Purpose: executing a well-defined plan
    • Memphis SWAT
  • Ad hoc teams
    • Purpose: solve a specific problem and absolves when it is solved
    • Multi-team systems
• Principles of teamwork
  • Members provide feedback to and accept it from one another
  • The willingness, preparedness, and proclivity to back fellow members up during operations
  • Members’ collectively viewing themselves as a group whose success depends on their interaction
  • Fostering within-team interdependence
  • Team leadership makes a difference with respect to the performance of the team
• Team structure
  • Diversity in teams
    • differences in other team members
  • Information diversity
    • differences in knowledge and cognitive resources of team members
  • Value diversity
    • fundamental differences among people with regard to tastes, preferences, goals and interests
• Roles in teams
  • Leadership Functions
    • Leader
    • Shaper
      • influences the way that the team’s effort is applied, directing attention to the setting of objectives and priorities
  • Work Producers
    • Worker
      • gets things done
    • Creator
      • advances new ideas and strategies with special attention to major issues and addressing new ways to do things
    • Completer-finisher
      • searches for aspects of work that need more than usual degree of attention and maintains sense of urgency in team
  • Internal team maintenance
    • Monitor-evaluator
      • analyzes problems and suggestions so team stays focused on task
      • critic
    • Team facilitator
      • supports team members in their strengths, helps compensate for the weaknesses, and improves communication between members by fostering team spirit
      • Liaison to people/resources outside the team
    • Resource investigator
• Team processes
  • Socialization
    • Process of ongoing mutual adjustment
    • Three psychological concepts of the socialization process
      • Evaluation
        • attempts by team and individual to assess and maximize each other’s values
      • Commitment
        • sense of loyalty, union, and connection between individuals and teams
      • Role transition
        • occurs when commitment reaches a certain level
• Five phases of team membership
  • Investigation
    • team searches for individuals who can contribute to the achievement of team goals
  • Socialization
    • individual assimilates into team and team accommodates itself to individual
  • Maintenance
    • both parties try to maximize their respective needs
    • achievement of team
    • satisfaction of individual
  • Re-socialization
    • When commitment weakens
    • team and individual try again to influence each other so that the team’s needs are more likely to be satisfied
  • Remembrance
    • when resocialization is unsuccessful
    • team remembers individuals contributions to the team
    • and individual recalls his experiences
• Interpersonal processes in teams (influences team performance)
  • Communication
    • Needs to be consistent
  • Conflict
    • unavoidable
    • Beneficial (want) v. competitive (avoid) conflict
  • Cohesion
    • members feel attached to the team and want to stay in it
  • Trust
    • The belief that even though you have no control over how your team member will behave, you believe, trust and have faith in your team members will behave in a way that benefits the team
  • Shared mental models
    • Similar approach to acquiring, storing, and using information
    • helps members predict and understand teammate
    • Four categories of what is shared
      • Task-specific knowledge
      • Task-related knowledge
      • Knowledge of teammate
      • Attitudes and beliefs
    • Groupthink
      • Individual members don’t voice differing opinions because they feel they have a good thing going
      • Nazi Germany
  • Team mentality
    • The whole team listens and comes together to form decision
• Decision-making in teams
  • Multilevel theory of team decision-making
    • Team informity
      • how well informed the team is on the issues they must address
    • Staff validity
      • average individual team member’s abilities to make accurate decisions
    • Dyadic sensitivity
      • Leaders ability to weigh certain opinions more than others based on individuals knowledge
• Performance Appraisal in Teams
  • Similar to individual performance but additional factors influence as well (group vs. individual rewards).
    • Social loafing
      • Free-riding
    • Sucker effect
      • Not wanting to contribute more than other members. Doesn’t want to do all the work
    • Felt Dispensability
      • feeling of being dispensable
    • Peer appraisals
• Five social skills critical for team members
  • Gain the group acceptance
  • Increase group solidarity
  • Be aware of the group consciousness
  • Share the group identification
  • Manage other’s impressions of him/her
• Personnel selection for teams
  • Identifying the best mix of personnel for effective team performance
  • Task work skills v. teamwork skills
• Team training
  • Foster common ways for team members to analyze info and make decisions
    • Thinking
    • Doing
    • Feeling
• Virtual teams
  • teams not located in same place
  • Virtual environment
  • Three characteristics of virtual teams
    • Electronic communication
    • Geographical dispersion
    • Synchronous & asynchronous interaction
  • Virtual worker & virtual manager